President Trump promises to lift regulations for community banks

Holds listening session with small banks across country

President Donald Trump held a listening session Thursday to talk to leaders of community banks.

In the session, also attended by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Gary Cohn, head of the National Economics Council, Trump promised lenders that soon they would be safe to loan and create jobs, according to an article by Renae Merle for The Washington Post.

During the hour-long meeting, Trump encouraged Mnuchin and Cohn to address the regulatory burdens mentioned by the bankers within six months, according to an industry official who attended the meeting. He also said the White House is “very, very close” to announcing a nominee for a Federal Reserve Board seat reserved for a community banker, a position that has been vacant for more than two years, the official said.

And the banks provided positive feedback about the listening session and their impression of Trump.

“It was really clear, he is a businessman, he understands the relationships between lenders and borrowers,” said Camden Fine, president of the Independent Community Bankers of America. “He really drilled down and was very knowledgeable about several of the regulations the bankers brought up. He could empathize with them.”

“The whole tone of the meeting was we want to help the community banks on main street,” he said.

But Trump wasn’t the only one talking about loosening regulations. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer also brought up the administration’s commitment to rolling back regulation and reforming Dodd-Frank on Thursday.

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Kelsey Ramírez is an Associate Editor at HousingWire. In this role she spearheads the production of HW Magazine. Ramírez is a journalism graduate of University of Texas at Arlington. She previously covered hard issues such as homelessness and domestic violence.

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